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Two Poems

Issue 72, Winter 1977

The Legend Of St. Ursula

Peekèd, they peer into the future.They have unsteady bottoms to their ships,eleven thousand sea-sick virginswith devils sitting on their hats,

I saw three ships go sailing byin many tales of many lands.Does Ursula the captain knowwhere she shall land her fragile crew?It’s safer to keep sailing onthan to be owned by pagan men,though devils twitter, “Oh steady groundwhere the green gardens grow!”

Ursula claims a heavenly spousecalled Christ, Freya before her sailedthrough the skies, wild as the moon,trailed by stars, in search of a man.Or was it this same ship which tookwings in a sea turned upside down?In which case, the dizzying heightswould add to the discomfort.